1960s Teisco Burns-Branded Vintage Hollowbody Violin Bass Red Sunburst w/ Case, Japan

Up for sale, a 1960s Teisco Burns-branded violin bass in exceptional, 100% original condition and in perfect working order. One of Teisco's most upscale violin basses, and also an instrument that adheres more closely than most Japanese-made violin basses in its body shape and control layout to its Hofner 500/1 cousin (no relation), this Burns-branded bass is an exquisitely well-kept vintage instrument, complete with its original hardshell case.Featuring fully hollow construction with the traditional violin bass tonewood complement of a spruce top and maple back and sides, this bass also has the familiar control layout of a Hofner, with individual On/Off switches for each single coil pickup as well as a global two-way Tone switch. The bass is strung with medium tension 45-100 flatwound strings, delivering smooth pluck and fat thump. The bass has a broader and sweeter sound with the Tone switch in the Up position, and more tic-tac cut and upper midrange articulation with the switch in the Down position. Each pickup singled out has a distinctive, vital sound, with more smooth rumble and girth from the neck pickup, and more burp and detailed cut from the bridge position, which is present yet never “bright, “ with a rolled off high treble voicing. The bass is featherweight at 6lbs, professionally dialed in here at Mike & Mike's Guitar Bar with comfortable action and accurate intonation.The three-piece maple neck has a deep U neck profile carve with ample substance, and it's a shape that fills the palm yet is still easily navigable for smaller hands. The profile measures .940" deep at the 1st fret and 1.030" at the 12th. The very dark, tight-grained rosewood fretboard retains the original perfect slender fretwire, and the bass plays easily up the 30" scale. The nut measures 1 5/8" wide at the zero fret just forward of the nut, and the headstock retains its original raised Burns badge (ostensibly unrelated to the British brand of the same name). The original chrome-plated tuning machines hold pitch well and turn smoothly.The body features untouched electronics that function flawlessly, and the V- and T-embossed machined metal Master Volume and Tone knobs govern the single coil pickup pair. The chrome plating is notably clean on the tuners, neck plate, trapeze tailpiece, and pickup surrounds, and the plastics are rounded out by the original parchment pickguard with solid carved rosewood tug bar. The glossy Red Sunburst finish is framed by multi-ply binding on the spruce top, and the finish is exceedingly clean, showing only a few faint marks in the clear coat of the gloss on the body as a whole. The neck profile gloss finish is flawless.The original hardshell case with aluminum trim and gold interior is included.